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Friday, June 24, 2011

The Breast Milk Cure

There was an incredible op-ed piece in the New York Times yesterday by enlightened author Nicolas Kristof about using breast milk as the cure for so many children's deaths in third world countries. It really was rather shocking to read that too many of these countries have very low breastfeeding rates; they are too poor to buy artificial milk and yet somehow they do, using contaminated water. How did this happen? Breastfeeding is free, easily accessible and breast milk protects children from numerous diseases and infections. In fact here in the U.S. nearly 1,000 babies lives would be saved from breastfeeding.

While I admit that there are a variety of reasons for this, I can't help but be a little suspicious and cynical because breastfeeding has been undermined by big business for decades here in the U.S. and abroad. Breastmilk is free, natural and can't be patented (at least not yet) which may be one of the reasons it's not been its not being promoted. The West has tremendous influence on the rest of the world and until we as a society are committed to breastfeeding we will continue lose the lives of millions of children every year. So read the article and judge for yourself.

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Welcome to the Parent's Lifeline Blog

Welcome to Parents' Lifeline Blog. Parents' Lifeline offers personal and confidential parent coaching, consulting and caring emotional support for parents, no matter where you live or your family circumstances. Lysa Parker, PL owner and Certified Family Life Educator, blogs about parents' and children's issues, commentaries on current issues in the news as well as answering your most burning questions. The purpose is to be a virtual lifeline and to keep parents and child-advocacy professionals informed about what's happening and how it affects families in their daily lives. This blog is for you so please make comments, send your questions and please do share with your friends! Let me know what is important to you!